Border Guard of Binh Dinh province carries out the work of mass mobilization

Perceiving and implementing the Party’s position on mass mobilization work, the Border Guard of Binh Dinh province has always regarded this work as a central task so as to bring into play the all people's synergy to protect sea and island border security and sovereignty and make contribution to the province’s socioeconomic development.

Cadres of Binh Dinh Border Guard work with fishermen before
their offshore fishing (photo: baobinhdinh.com.vn)

The province of Binh Dinh, belonging to the South Central Coast, with a coastline of 134.5 km, holds a strategic position of economy, defence and security. The province possesses great potential for development of maritime economy, particularly for fishing and aquaculture; thus, people’s awareness and living condition have increasingly improved; its social order and security is basically maintained. However, foreign vessels’ violation of our country’s waters and our fishermen’s violation of other countries’ waters have been on the rise; complaints that go directly to the higher level without going through the lower levels as well as collective complaints particularly in areas of sea and island border have still existed. Grasping and implementing the Party’s resolutions and directives on mass mobilization, Border Guard of Binh Dinh as the core force in management and protection of sovereignty and security of the province’s sea and island border area have proactively adopted various measures to improve the effectiveness of the mass mobilization and obtained considerable results.

The province’s Border Guard has successfully conducted the work of persuading the people to take part in protection of border sovereignty and security. Considering it as a central task of the mass mobilization work, the Unit has always been proactive in counselling the Provincial People’s Committee to introduce and execute the Government’s Decree on “management of operations of people and vehicles in the area of sea border of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam” and the Project on “law propagation and dissemination for cadres and people in the sea and island border areas in the 2013-2016 period”. It has actively worked with the local authorities to persuade the people to implement the campaign “all people take part in protection of national territorial sovereignty and border security in the new situation” according to the Prime Minister’s Directive 01/CT-TTg, thereby bringing into play the role and a sense of responsibility of all people, particularly of fishermen in protecting national sovereignty over seas and islands.

Facing complicated developments in seas, such as other countries’ increased illegal operations in the Spratly Islands and Paracel Islands, foreign vessels’ violation of Vietnam’s waters and island sovereignty, the Province’s Border Guard has provided timely information for cadres and people to grasp the situation while clarifying the Party and the State’s viewpoint and guideline on safeguarding sea and island sovereignty and fighting against hostile forces’ plots and acts of sabotage so as to make the people have a sound grasp of the situation and prevent hostile forces’ distortion and incitement from negatively affecting the task of protecting Homeland seas and islands.

Fishermen represent the force directly exercising national sovereignty in the sea and act as “eyes and ears” in support for the Border Guard and relevant functional agencies to grasp and deal with the situations and perform the task of law enforcement in the sea. Therefore, on the one hand, the Province’s Border Guard has counselled the local party committees and authorities to build and implement mechanisms and policies for encouraging the fishermen to keep their mind in their fishing activity and combine this with protection of national sovereignty. On the other hand, border defence units have directly conducted the propagation work to raise fishermen’s patriotism and responsibility towards national protection, especially in the sea. As a result, the fishermen have proactively provided information for border defence posts on the situation concerning national sovereignty, security and safety, which facilitates the work of combating and preventing violations of law in the sea.

A part from persuading the people to take in part protection of border sovereignty and security, the Province’s Border Guard has actively engaged in effective settlement of complex issues of localities. Binh Dinh is among the localities possessing the largest number of offshore fishing vessels; most of its fishermen stringently observe law and regulations for maritime operations. However, during their offshore fishing, several fishermen have violated other countries’ waters; they have even been captured, and their assets have been ruined by foreign law enforcement agencies. That has caused fishermen's great loss in economic and spiritual aspects and badly affected our relations with other countries. Against this backdrop, under the leadership of the Provincial People’s Committee, the Border Guard of Binh Dinh has worked with local governments, departments and sectors to step up the propagation work for fishermen to clearly perceive the country’s sea sovereignty and borderline among seas, while providing them with GPS-integrated HF long-range radios, directly propagating knowledge of national sea sovereignty, raising their sense of respect for the international law of the sea, and making them firmly grasp geographic coordinates of points in the seas of Vietnam. Border guard posts have counseled coastal districts and cities to hold conferences for working towards solutions to fishermen’s violation of other countries’ waters, i.e. attributing violations of vessels and fishermen to responsibility of party committees and authorities of coastal communes, regarding this as a criterion for emulation of achievements in localities, persuading fishermen to make written commitments to not violating other countries’ waters, and not providing State’s aid to fishing and aquaculture for those who violate other countries’ waters.

Over the past years, Binh Dinh has launched many socioeconomic development projects (mainly for coastal areas). During the course of implementation of those projects, there appeared complicated issues when the people disagreed with the policy for site clearance and claimed that the projects had badly impacted the environment, thereby leading to oppositional gatherings and destabilizing local politics and social order. Against this backdrop, the Province’s Border Guard proactively gave advice to local party committees and authorities on guidelines and measures to completely deal with each case, while opportunely deploying cadres and troops from border guard agencies and posts in cooperation with other forces to take part in meetings of village and commune level party cells to grasp the situation, hold dialogue with the people and persistently explain the Party’s guideline, the province’s socioeconomic development policy and benefits of those projects to them. Consequently, that made contribution to step by step stabilizing the situation, preventing opportunists and dissidents from inciting the people and causing “flashpoints”, and creating favourable conditions for investors to continue carrying out their projects.

Moreover, the Province’s Border Guard has successfully implemented the Party’s policy for religion in the area. In the coastal areas of Binh Dinh, there exist 5 religions with 108 facilities for worship and more than 42,000 followers, accounting for 6.29% of the province’s population. Basically, religious followers abide by the Party’s guideline and the State’s law and make considerable contribution to province’s development. However, religious operations are easily exploited to destabilize political security and social order in the area by hostile forces. Hence, on the basis of the Resolution 25-NQ/TW of the Party Central Committee (9th tenure) on religious work, over the past years, the Province’s Border Guard has always considered the work of mass mobilization in the areas of religious followers as one of the centerpieces to make contribution to socioeconomic, cultural development and maintained political security and social order of the province’s coastal areas. Accordingly, border guard units of the province have been active in counselling local party committees and governments and working with sectors and organizations to persuade religious dignitaries and followers to observe the Party’s guideline and the State’s law on the religious work. They have also cooperated with the Vietnam Fatherland Front of the province’s coastal communes in visiting and giving presents to religious houses in the area, while persuading religious dignitaries to strictly conform to law in their practice of religion and combine preaching activity with dissemination of regulations of law to religious followers. Due attention has been paid to the work of education and propagation regarding the people’s freedom of belief and religion as well as the prevention of hostile forces’ exploitation of religion to induce and incite the people to destabilize social order.

Comprehending the Party’s guideline and successfully carrying the work of mass mobilization have greatly contributed to Binh Dinh Border Guard’s successful fulfilment of border defence work and the people’s strengthened faith in the leadership of the Party and local party committees and authorities. Successful implementation of the mass mobilization work has also cemented the bond between border guards, local party committees and authorities and the people so as to strive for the province’s socioeconomic development and protection of Homeland sea and island sovereignty.

Mass mobilization as one of the Party’s fundamental tasks greatly contributes to cultivating blood relations between the Party and the people and building a firm posture of “the people’s hearts and minds”. In the new situation, it is essential that mass mobilization continue to be promoted to truly serve as a bridge between “the Party’s intent” and “the people’s will” and to uphold the strength of the great national unity in the cause of national construction and defense